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OUR STATE lawmakers could learn a thing or two from the Greek philosophers such as Sophocles: “Without labor nothing prospers.”
Pennsylvania is in its third month without a 2009-10 spending plan, and there’s little evidence that either our Democratic governor and his allies or the GOP-controlled Senate are working diligently to resolve their differences.
On Tuesday, according to The Associated Press, the House-Senate conference committee met for two hours without making substantial progress. Sadly, it was the first face-to-face session since late July.
When the short session ended, Rep. Dwight Evans, the committee chairman, said no more meetings are likely until after Labor Day.
Now lawmakers, like the millions of Pennsylvanians they govern, are preparing to celebrate a long Labor Day weekend. Quite frankly, they haven’t earned a holiday.
Members of the General Assembly and the governor should stay in Harrisburg this holiday weekend, have the committee negotiate until an agreement is struck and then vote on the compromise package. If the vote fails, keep redoing the process until a budget is worked out.
Forced negotiations have a way of getting things done.
Crestwood School District, which had been the local poster child for prolonged contract negotiations, recently has reached agreements with teachers and support staff. It appears a judge’s order in late spring that negotiators meet daily on the support staff contract broke the deadlock.
As of this week, Pennsylvania has the distinction of being the only state still without a budget.
And because lawmakers did not complete their jobs in Harrisburg, we’re feeling it at home: Day care operators are suffering because state subsidies are being withheld; payments totaling about $23 million this month aren’t flowing to school districts; programs affecting senior citizens and others are running short.
Meanwhile, lawmakers issue press releases, stage news conferences and cling to political ideologies that leave state government’s most important task unfinished: Taking care of the people’s needs.
By foregoing the upcoming holiday, our lawmakers can learn from another Greek philosopher, Aristotle: “The end of labor is to gain leisure.”
And not before.
Members of the General Assembly and the governor should stay in
Harrisburg this holiday weekend …